Flora Zhu

Class of 2013

Packaging Designer, Southern Telecom Inc.Founder, Canvas June

Biography

Flora Zhu Strauss is currently a full-time packaging designer at Southern Telecom, a consumer electronic company located in Brooklyn, New York. She holds an MFA in Industrial Design from the Rochester Institute of Technology and a BFA in Product Design from Beijing University of Technology. In the summer of 2012 Flora participated in the Danish Institute for Study Abroad, where she learned furniture design and produced her own handmade seating that was shown during the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in NYC. In September 2013, she started her own fashion blog titled "Canvas June", where she shares her personal thoughts about fashion, design, and life with people from around the world. She opened her first Etsy.com store in 2014 and is presently retailing her handmade designs for customers in the United States.

Packaging for Catherine Malandrino Electronics Accessory Collection

The Catherine Malandrino electronics accessory line was designed under the Southern Telecom license for the 2015 Spring / Summer collection. Catherine Malandrino is a French fashion designer whose contemporary collections embody femininity and strength. The electronics accessory line packaging was created exclusively with Catherine Malandrino’s design aesthetic in mind. Her trademark “C” envelops each item, showcasing the different product selections that are available under the Catherine Malandrino name. The design of each individual package required a focus on fashionable graphic elements, elegant details, and creative ways in which the vessels open to reveal the object inside. The final packaging designs also take into account and are dependant upon; the product’s retail category, shipping weight, transportation durability, material usage, and intended display location in a retail environment. Products in the 2015 Spring / Summer collection include: iPhone Cases, Universal Folio Cases, Battery Packs, Car Chargers, Bluetooth Speakers, and Earbuds.

Personal Anecdote

When we were approached to create the whole look and feel for the Catherine Malandrino electronic accessory line, the Southern Telecom team focused on connecting a family of products with a cohesive, unified aesthetic across all areas of design. Our main objective was to follow the design doctrine that fashion icon, Catherine Malandrino, had laid out for her brand. Maintaining a strong, feminine identity in our work was critical to producing a desirable luxury electronic accessories collection.The packaging division explored design concepts through sketching, 3D modeling, physical mockups, dieline creation, and graphic design elements. Our most important decisions were while selecting the proper paperboard thickness for the outer structure of each box and surrounding it with a metallic paper wrap. The selection of these materials provided a glamorous visual appeal to compliment the products held within. The internal structural components and enclosure methods were developed based upon the adoption of the exterior materials.Multiple production dielines were prepared for the boxes and outer metallic wrap to achieve the final state of the packaging. We were critically challenged when calculating the design of each individual sized package. A perfect dimensional fit was required so that the branded letter “C” did not change or conflict with the function of the box across all product categories.